Latest news from Kent's School of Economics

Monthly Archives: March 2015

Lanre Kassim, an Economics PhD student, has won a Kent Union Teaching Award. The annual awards were created, and are run by students to recognise and reward staff for their commitment to the delivery of excellent teaching.

Many congratulations to Lanre, who was presented with the award for ‘Postgraduates who teach’ at a ceremony yesterday evening (30 March 2015). Lanre teaches on the first year module, ‘Introduction to Economics’. Lanre commented, “I would like to thank the School of Economics for the opportunity to teach; and also thank Wei Jiang, John Peirson, Manuel Toledo and Alan Carruth for the privilege of being an assistant to them. I dedicate the award to the School and all my students”.

An Economics student is one of 20 students to be awarded a place on the University’s European Summer School in Brussels. Aanisah Bibi Zainab Bauluck, a second-year student, was selected from over 300 applicants.

The European Summer School programme has been established as part of the University’s 50th anniversary celebrations, and builds on our international reputation and specialist postgraduate centres in Brussels and Paris. The Summer Schools will enable both those working and studying to develop their knowledge of the politics of the European Union (EU) or study the revolutionary influences of French history and culture

The Brussels Summer School is centred on the theme of ‘Europe and the World’, and within this context various sub-themes will be also covered, including migration, the European Union’s (EU) relationship with emerging powers such as China, and the EU’s response to the global economic crisis.

Over a period of two weeks, students will participate in a series of guest lectures, seminars and debates delivered by academics, policy-makers, diplomats and European civil servants. Students will also benefit from a careers workshop which gives an insight into a range of employment opportunities as well as the transferable skills which are attractive to potential employers. To mark the end of the Summer School in Brussels, there will be a formal dinner to congratulate students for successfully completing the programme.

Many congratulations, Aanisah, from the School of Economics! We hope you enjoy your time in Brussels.

Professor Jagjit Chadha gave his fourth Gresham Lecture on Thursday 26 March on ‘The Science of Monetary Policy’.

Overview: The near loss of price stability in the 1970s led to serious attention being paid to the role of expectations in economic management and the need to find monetary rules that respected changing incentives faced by households and firms under different economic environments. Models were then developed that mostly yielded arguments for price stability under an interest rate feedback rule and for a decade or so, under the Long Expansion, all seemed well.

The School is introducing a new 15-credit module to the Economics Stage 2 and 3 options list.

The module, entitled ‘Economic Controversies’, will teach the skills of economic reasoning and argument by exposing students to the big debates within the discipline and in economic policy.

The module draws on current and past controversies across many economics sub-disciplines.
This equips students with the ability both to understand and contribute to the debates surrounding the recognised controversies within the discipline. The curriculum also provides an insight into the academic and professional development of the discipline.

Four controversies are covered each academic year, drawn from a range of topics pertinent to the discipline and relevant subdisciplines, for example: ‘Is the living wage a good idea?’, What is the best way to understand inflation?’, Are currency unions ever a good idea?’ and ‘How far should governments intervene in markets, families and the way individuals make choices?’.

Economic Controversies (EC538) will be available to study in Spring 2016.

A workshop, jointly organised by MaGHiC and Aix-Marseilles School of Economics, entitled
‘Macroeconomic challenges in the international economy’ was held on 20 March at the Chateau Lafarge in Aix -en-Provence.

Papers were presented on areas such as international financial contagion, international policy co-ordination, real exchange rate devaluation and growth, and fiscal devaluations. We were
glad to welcome some top international macroeconomists such as Michael Devereux
(University of British Columbia) and Charles Engle (University of Wisconsin).

The School of Economics is hosting a special seminar as part of the University of Kent’s 50th Anniversary celebrations on Wednesday 8 April 2015. The seminar will be given by Andrew Clark and Andrew Oswald on “The Economics of Happiness: Does money make you happy and if not what does?’ and will held in Keynes Lecture Theatre 1 at 4 pm, followed by a drinks reception at 5.30 pm.

Andrew Clark and Andrew Oswald were pioneers in the empirical study of happiness, beginning in the 1990s, and have worked extensively on the issue since, producing several seminal contributions.

Andrew Clark will begin by explaining the Easterlin Paradox, regarding the relationship between money and happiness. He will then discuss how the debate has developed to cover such things as religion and life events like marriage and divorce. Andrew Oswald will discuss the overlap between the latest social-science research on happiness and scientific work in biology, brain science, and primatology.

Andrew Clark is Professor of Economics at the Paris School of Economics. Particular interests include the use of job and life satisfaction data to analyse labour market phenomena. He has also looked at the role of income inequality and habituation for happiness.

Andrew Oswald is a Professor of Economics at the University of Warwick. His work lies mainly at the border between economics and behavioural science, and includes the study of human happiness. His work, for instance, has looked at how happiness is affected by life events such as divorce and employment.

If you would like to attend the seminar, please email Lisa Jones at L.T.Jones@kent.ac.uk.

Following the Warsh Review of transparency practices and procedures at the Bank of England (Warsh, 2014), the Bank plans to change the structure of its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meetings and release its policy decisions, ‘enhanced’ meeting minutes and (once a quarter) the Inflation Report all at the same time (Bank of England, 2014).

In its latest monthly survey of leading UK-based macroeconomists, the Centre for Macroeconomics has canvassed views on the idea of simultaneously providing the different MPC documents and changing the MPC process. Click here to read an article published on VOX, the CEPR‘s Policy Portal, on 17 March by Angus Armstrong, Francesco Caselli, Wouter den Haan and the School’s Professor Jagjit Chadha.